Bow Hunting....

[h2oville rocket]

I agree with GT here- in hunting the animal has a chance- might get away, might gore the hunter, might die. The slaughterhouse animals are just plain goin' down. Vast difference. In both cases the animals are used for food. I will admit I have never eaten a carp- fished/hunted them purely for pleasure which no doubt led to my serial killer tendencies and my UT fandom which some consider to be roughly equivalent.

[Pete Segaard]

I think maybe hunting is too divisive of a topic then.

Not for most of us...

It certainly is for me.

I don't hunt. I have no desire to do so. I do enjoy fishing, though.

But, at the risk of starting some massive argument, may I ask what you could POSSIBLY have against HUNTING? It really sounds like you're coming at this from a moral/ethical standpoint, and if that's your stance you better start off with saying you're a vegetarian...

It better huh? OR else........

There is a vast difference from killing animals for enjoyment/sport and killing animals solely for food. If you would like to discuss further please PM me so we avoid the divisive discussion that the admins wisely want us to avoid.

Not to be divisive, but... What is the vast difference?
When I hunted for enjoyment/sport, the act of hunting (and it was an act as I am not a very succesful hunter) put meat on the table that I used for nourishment. It is primal, it heightens my senses, it makes me appreciate what I put on the table whether it is wild game or grocery store fare. I appreciate the bounty that the Earth provides. If there is something wrong with that then I guess I will need to deal with that someday.

[hammb]

I guess I just naturally assume that anyone here who hunts is doing so for food. I'll gladly agree that there seems something morally wrong about killing an animal to just mount its head on the wall or whatever, but I don't think anybody actually does that. They put the head on the wall (if they feel like it) and still eat the meat. I've never met a hunter anywhere that doesn't eat the meat. Except, I guess for pests like groundhogs...

My point about being a vegetarian is just that the animals that become our meat in the modern mass market food industry are treated about as awful as you can possibly imagine. It's FAR more cruel than shooting a deer in a meadow. The way they're cramped into tight quarters, stuffed with drugs, given a diet to fatten them up to slaughter weight as quickly as possible, etc.

Personally I have no desire to hunt, because quite honestly I don't care for the flavor of most wild game.

[h2oville rocket]

The way they're cramped into tight quarters, stuffed with drugs, given a diet to fatten them up to slaughter weight as quickly as possible, etc.

Are you talking about the BG offensive linemen that live in the quads?

[Globetrotter]

I guess I just naturally assume that anyone here who hunts is doing so for food. I'll gladly agree that there seems something morally wrong about killing an animal to just mount its head on the wall or whatever, but I don't think anybody actually does that. They put the head on the wall (if they feel like it) and still eat the meat. I've never met a hunter anywhere that doesn't eat the meat. Except, I guess for pests like groundhogs...

My point about being a vegetarian is just that the animals that become our meat in the modern mass market food industry are treated about as awful as you can possibly imagine. It's FAR more cruel than shooting a deer in a meadow. The way they're cramped into tight quarters, stuffed with drugs, given a diet to fatten them up to slaughter weight as quickly as possible, etc.

Personally I have no desire to hunt, because quite honestly I don't care for the flavor of most wild game.

Since we are avoiding PMs.

I think that abundance of food available is one element but what is more is the fact that they are trophies. Ten pt buck, 11 pt buck etc. You killed a living creature for sport. I can not imagine staring at an animal and thinking well I could leave it go and let it go about its life, or I could see how good of aim I have with this gun and kill it. I can't get beyond the seeing something alive and knowing I don't have to kill it to survive but killing it anyway.

I agree with your arguments in terms of raising animals for food. They are placed in horrific situations. If I had stronger will power I probably would be a vegetarian. But there is a difference in raising something for food and killing the animal to feed others and staring at a living creature through a scope and killing it because it has more pts on its head, or because you might get a little rush.

[BGFan]

I guess I just naturally assume that anyone here who hunts is doing so for food. I'll gladly agree that there seems something morally wrong about killing an animal to just mount its head on the wall or whatever, but I don't think anybody actually does that. They put the head on the wall (if they feel like it) and still eat the meat. I've never met a hunter anywhere that doesn't eat the meat. Except, I guess for pests like groundhogs...

My point about being a vegetarian is just that the animals that become our meat in the modern mass market food industry are treated about as awful as you can possibly imagine. It's FAR more cruel than shooting a deer in a meadow. The way they're cramped into tight quarters, stuffed with drugs, given a diet to fatten them up to slaughter weight as quickly as possible, etc.

Personally I have no desire to hunt, because quite honestly I don't care for the flavor of most wild game.

Since we are avoiding PMs.

I think that abundance of food available is one element but what is more is the fact that they are trophies. Ten pt buck, 11 pt buck etc. You killed a living creature for sport. I can not imagine staring at an animal and thinking well I could leave it go and let it go about its life, or I could see how good of aim I have with this gun and kill it. I can't get beyond the seeing something alive and knowing I don't have to kill it to survive but killing it anyway.

I agree with your arguments in terms of raising animals for food. They are placed in horrific situations. If I had stronger will power I probably would be a vegetarian. But there is a difference in raising something for food and killing the animal to feed others and staring at a living creature through a scope and killing it because it has more pts on its head, or because you might get a little rush.

There is something that you need to bare in mind. In this area deer no longer have a natural predator hunting it for food (i.e. wolves). As a result they have become over populated (which is evidenced by the large number of deer automobile accidents that occur in this area). Left unchecked the population reaches the point where the deer are starving to death. Hunting them is the only viable way to keep the population under control. Ask any ranger or naturalist in the state park system and they will tell you the same thing. One of my best friends is a ranger in the Wood County Park district....starving deer is a big problem.

[Globetrotter]

I guess I just naturally assume that anyone here who hunts is doing so for food. I'll gladly agree that there seems something morally wrong about killing an animal to just mount its head on the wall or whatever, but I don't think anybody actually does that. They put the head on the wall (if they feel like it) and still eat the meat. I've never met a hunter anywhere that doesn't eat the meat. Except, I guess for pests like groundhogs...

My point about being a vegetarian is just that the animals that become our meat in the modern mass market food industry are treated about as awful as you can possibly imagine. It's FAR more cruel than shooting a deer in a meadow. The way they're cramped into tight quarters, stuffed with drugs, given a diet to fatten them up to slaughter weight as quickly as possible, etc.

Personally I have no desire to hunt, because quite honestly I don't care for the flavor of most wild game.

Since we are avoiding PMs.

I think that abundance of food available is one element but what is more is the fact that they are trophies. Ten pt buck, 11 pt buck etc. You killed a living creature for sport. I can not imagine staring at an animal and thinking well I could leave it go and let it go about its life, or I could see how good of aim I have with this gun and kill it. I can't get beyond the seeing something alive and knowing I don't have to kill it to survive but killing it anyway.

I agree with your arguments in terms of raising animals for food. They are placed in horrific situations. If I had stronger will power I probably would be a vegetarian. But there is a difference in raising something for food and killing the animal to feed others and staring at a living creature through a scope and killing it because it has more pts on its head, or because you might get a little rush.

There is something that you need to bare in mind. In this area deer no longer have a natural predator hunting it for food (i.e. wolves). As a result they have become over populated (which is evidenced by the large number of deer automobile accidents that occur in this area). Left unchecked the population reaches the point where the deer are starving to death. Hunting them is the only viable way to keep the population under control. Ask any ranger or naturalist in the state park system and they will tell you the same thing. One of my best friends is a ranger in the Wood County Park district....starving deer is a big problem.

So then we should kill them for sport? I don't see the necessary connection.

[BGFan]

I guess I just naturally assume that anyone here who hunts is doing so for food. I'll gladly agree that there seems something morally wrong about killing an animal to just mount its head on the wall or whatever, but I don't think anybody actually does that. They put the head on the wall (if they feel like it) and still eat the meat. I've never met a hunter anywhere that doesn't eat the meat. Except, I guess for pests like groundhogs...

My point about being a vegetarian is just that the animals that become our meat in the modern mass market food industry are treated about as awful as you can possibly imagine. It's FAR more cruel than shooting a deer in a meadow. The way they're cramped into tight quarters, stuffed with drugs, given a diet to fatten them up to slaughter weight as quickly as possible, etc.

Personally I have no desire to hunt, because quite honestly I don't care for the flavor of most wild game.

Since we are avoiding PMs.

I think that abundance of food available is one element but what is more is the fact that they are trophies. Ten pt buck, 11 pt buck etc. You killed a living creature for sport. I can not imagine staring at an animal and thinking well I could leave it go and let it go about its life, or I could see how good of aim I have with this gun and kill it. I can't get beyond the seeing something alive and knowing I don't have to kill it to survive but killing it anyway.

I agree with your arguments in terms of raising animals for food. They are placed in horrific situations. If I had stronger will power I probably would be a vegetarian. But there is a difference in raising something for food and killing the animal to feed others and staring at a living creature through a scope and killing it because it has more pts on its head, or because you might get a little rush.

There is something that you need to bare in mind. In this area deer no longer have a natural predator hunting it for food (i.e. wolves). As a result they have become over populated (which is evidenced by the large number of deer automobile accidents that occur in this area). Left unchecked the population reaches the point where the deer are starving to death. Hunting them is the only viable way to keep the population under control. Ask any ranger or naturalist in the state park system and they will tell you the same thing. One of my best friends is a ranger in the Wood County Park district....starving deer is a big problem.

So then we should kill them for sport? I don't see the necessary connection.

Wow...

No...I guess we should just let them starve to death. Ask the next naturalist that you meet which method is more humane.

[factman]

Let's talk politics and religion too, so we can get the site shut down again!

[hammb]

This isn't religion or politics, and I would like to think that we'd all be able to maintain a civil level of discourse that doesn't resort to name calling or insults that are the things that led to the board getting shut down.

As to the issue at hand I guess Globe and I will never see eye to eye. I do NOT see a fundamental difference between hunting and eating animals that are caught in the wild versus animals that are raised specifically FOR food. Either way the animal dies so that we can eat. Sure it is looked at as a recreational/fun activity for hunters, but they're still using it for food. Every pound of meat they harvest from wild game is a pound of meat they're not buying at the grocery store. One way or another an animal is dying for us to eat, so I don't really see the difference.

When I look at the situations Globe, you're saying that there is something morally wrong about going into the woods and shooting an innocent animal so that it can be meat for your freezer? But it is not morally wrong to breed innocent livestock far more often than nature intended, house them in enclosures far smaller than nature intended, stuff them full of drugs to prevent disease since they're so close together, stuff them with hormones so they grow quicker, and feed them an unnatural diet so they have the desired fat content? Then at the requisite time you herd off these (still innocent) "raised for food" animals to the slaughterhouse where they're killed, and cut into parts.

Why is one so morally incomprehensible that you compare it to becoming a serial killer, while the other is the accepted natural way of doing things?

I guess my thought is if you're a stickler for animal rights then the modern food industry has a LOT more moral issues than Joe Sixpack who sits in the woods hoping to get a clean shot at a deer.

[hammb]

Oh, and FWIW, I agree with you that I cannot imagine looking down the barrel of a gun and shooting an animal either. I much prefer being able to go to the market and pick which cuts of meat I want rather than killing and cleaning my own game.

I just don't have a moral problem with it.

[Flipper]

Civil discourse?....F**k each and every one of you....although I do think it's awesome that one of the pro hunting people here has a serial killer for an avatar...

Look...some people are just wired for hunting. They don't need to kill for food, but they like the connection of going out and killing what they eat...and yes, part of that satisfaction is killing something BIG.

I don't feel that way...hell, I put food out for the deer, turkeys and songbirds in the winterjust so I can look at them, but I'm not going to cluck my tongue and pass some kind of moral judgement on people who hunt

[Lord_Byron]

BGFan got it right, the lack of predators makes it essential to use hunting to control overpopulation.

In our town, we're surrounded by two large parks, the city of Rochester and Lake Ontario. Deer had gotten to be a huge problem in the '90s to the point that we led the nation in car-deer accidents. Since we were in an urban/suburban area, hunting was out, so to cull the herd they did 'bait and shoot'. Essentially, in a remote area of one of the parks, the stocked corn and let deer get used to coming there for food. Then they ambushed them.

Since then, there have been limited bow-hunts on the private property near the parks and the herd is pretty much under control. However, there still are deer everywhere.

I'm agnostic on hunting, if people want to hunt ethically, that's their perogative, but it's not for me.

I did read an article a couple of years ago in either Time or Scientific American about how hunting has actually resulted in 'reverse natural selection' for certain species. That is, since hunters usually will go after the largest animals or those with the largest antlers, the weaker and smaller animals get a chance to breed that they otherwise wouldn't have. So, animals that are genetically disposed to smaller antlers breed where they wouldn't have in nature since the predators would have favored them. That's why most hunters have a hard time finding animals with big racks.

I was checking the Boone and Crockett records on-line, and the dates of the record kills seem to bear this out. Most of them were more that 40 years ago.

[Globetrotter]

I never compared a hunter to a serial killer. Harming small animals is a trait that several serial killers had as young children.

I think the difference is the joy that is attached to the kill. I think that the conditions in animal processing are horrible, but I doubt the guy stands with the rod gun aimed at the cows head and derives excitement from it. Well I hope not. Thats the difference to me. And the fact that hunting is unneccessary now because we have countless other options available. If I had to kill the cows we would all be vegetarians though.

The options are not only let them starve to death or let people hunt them for sport. There are certainly other options. I think that argument is more for the hunters conscience.

Maybe we should start hunting starving homeless people like in Ice T's surviving the game. (This is a joke I understand the difference between humans and deer)

[Globetrotter]

Civil discourse?....F**k each and every one of you....although I do think it's awesome that one of the pro hunting people here has a serial killer for an avatar...

Look...some people are just wired for hunting. They don't need to kill for food, but they like the connection of going out and killing what they eat...and yes, part of that satisfaction is killing something BIG.

I don't feel that way...hell, I put food out for the deer, turkeys and songbirds in the winterjust so I can look at them, but I'm not going to cluck my tongue and pass some kind of moral judgement on people who hunt

This is what I cant get around in terms of hunting. I feed the deer around my house, ducks, geese etc. Just so I can look at them. I can't disconnect myself from thinking wow what an amazing creature to....I wonder how it tastes and if I can aim my gun well enough to find out.